Disease-causing microorganisms are ubiquitous in healthcare environments. These locations include hospitals, outpatient clinics, ambulatory surgical centers, nursing homes, doctors' offices, etc. In these locations pathogenic microorganisms are frequently found on patients' skin and clothing as well as on other surfaces including beds, linens, and diagnostic and therapeutic medical equipment.
Stethoscopes are medical equipment that are known to transmit pathogenic agents from patient to patient. Unless a health care provider sterilizes the stethoscope between each examination, a subsequent patient can become contaminated with microorganisms that may have been present on a prior patient. However, it is believed that the great majority of health care providers do not clean or sanitize their stethoscopes between examinations of different patients. Therefore many stethoscopes can end up transmitting numerous types of often-harmful microorganisms between patients.
To address this problem, there are known devices for covering stethoscopes in an effort to provide barrier protection. However these known designs have significant drawbacks. For example some designs only cover the head of the stethoscope, and therefore the rest of it remains exposed to possible contamination. Other designs cover a larger portion of the stethoscope, but are awkward for the user to work with (including in some instances, the requirement for a two-handed operation), or alternatively are relatively complex and expensive in their construction. This latter disadvantage can be due to a complex shape of the cover which increases manufacturing costs or due to the need for separate, relatively expensive components for use with the cover. Yet other known designs employ adhesives to attach protective covers to stethoscope heads. This can result in the head becoming fouled with adhesive residue thus exacerbating the transmission problem, as this can cause the stethoscopes to retain and thereby transmit an even greater number of microorganisms.
While known devices are directed to the same general problem addressed in this disclosure, there remains a need for an inexpensive, effective and easily-operated means for inhibiting the transmission of microorganisms via stethoscopes. It does not appear that there has been a general acceptance by health care providers of any of the known devices. It is believed that this lack of acceptance is largely due to the relative high expense, the lack of effectiveness or the impracticality of operation of the devices.
Thus there exists a need for improved methods and devices for inhibiting the transmission of microorganisms via stethoscopes, having a low cost and a simple, fast operation.